Cold fluid such as liquified nitrogen, can be topically applied to living tissue or growths thereon to freeze or ablate an area of tissue. However, topical application of coolant is typically only suitable for easily accessible areas of the body, such as the skin where the application of the fluid is commonly performed with a cotton swab.
Recent advances in the cryosurgical arts provide for the use of rigid applicators such as probes, through which a cool fluid circulates and wherein the outside wall of the probe is applied directly to a treatment site. However, it is difficult, if not impossible to apply a rigid applicator to the entirety of an irregular surface. Other prior art topical applicators such as the type having large "oil can" type coolant containers may provide better overall coverage than a cold probe but these "oil can" types by virtue of their size and rigidity, provide limited accessibility to subcutaneous regions of the body.
It would be desirable to have a device which could be utilized with current minimally invasive techniques to apply a coolant to internal tissues surfaces.